Full speed on pay-to-drive scheme

PAY-as-you-drive tolls will be the Government's answer to beating 'eternal gridlock' on Britain's roads, the new Transport Secretary said yesterday.

Douglas Alexander threw down the gauntlet for firms to come up with a scheme for tracking car journeys via satellite or roadside beacons.

He said he would be turning theory into practice by moving road-pricing 'from the why to the how'.

He is making £10m available to the private sector to make the pay-by-the mile technology work in practice.

Speed cameras also have 'a role to play', said Mr Alexander, who has a Peugeot 306 as well as his official ministerial car. His wife also has an unspecified car.

Ministers have outlined how road pricing could see drivers paying up to £1.50 a mile to drive at peak time and less at off-peak.

Cars fitted with a special black-box 'tag' could be tracked by satellite or via roadside beacons, and drivers would be billed directly to their home.

The new Transport Secretary who has taken over from fellow Scot Alistair Darling, said: 'As we travel more, because we live on a crowded island, congestion is set to grow, so if we do nothing we simply face eternal gridlock.'

'This (pay-as-you-drive) is one option that we need to look at if we are serious, not simply about fixing past problems but anticipating the problems we face in the future.'

The prize for motorists from road-pricing would be 'better value out of the road network', he told BBC Radio 4' s Today programme.

Tory Shadow transport secretary Chris Grayling said: 'Yet again we have a Secretary of State whose only solution to our transport problems seems to be a road pricing system which couldn't be introduced for a decade.

'We need action now to improve transport and not vague ideas for the distant future.'